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Archive for the ‘Advice and Beans Store’Category

This spring and summer has been a great adventure as we have worked to produce the best material and the best bags available for food storage. It has finally come to fruition as my wife and I (with her 16 weeks pregnant with twins!) unloaded a full truckload of new ShieldPro bags this weekend. It took about 4 hot, sweaty hours with my wife running the forklift and me manhandling pallets with a pallet jack. Our warehouse is now filled to the brim with beautiful, silvery, metally, Mylar-y goodness!

Folks here know we have kept our focus mainly food storage related over the years (and intend to keep it that way, mostly!). We have dabbled in some different products here and there, but through everything our main focus has been Mylar bags and oxygen absorbers. Thus, we are very proud to announce a product that fits in one of those categories, but expands nicely in a direction we want to be moving.

We’ve been receiving requests for this type of product for over a year now (over 100 customer comments in my little notebook at least), but finding manufacturing for something this specialized proved a little tricky. As we worked on the ShieldPro brand, we thought this would be a great addition to our focus of storage, though outside the food niche. I am very pleased to now offer the ShieldPro SafeCache storage bag.

This bag is awesome. It is 11″x55″ long, made of the 7.5 Mil SafeCache material, the strongest metalized foil substrate I have found (and I’ve looked at hundreds of materials during this process!). It is incredibly durable, with amazing barrier properties to moisture and oxygen. The size will fit most long guns and AR’s (some optics may have to be removed for storage), as well as a ton of different types of equipment you may want to store out of your home. It can be cut and resealed so that a single bag can fit multiple handguns, cameras, phones, or various electronics.

The challenge with trying to bury most standard gun cases is that water is a pretty amazing infiltrator, and it can and will seep through most everything. The SafeCache bag fixes all that. Used in conjunction with desiccant and standard storage procedures, you can bury whatever supplies you choose and know (barring earthquake or something crazy!) your valuables will be safe.

However, for our food storers, please don’t despair!=) We will have several new bags for y’all showing up at the store later this week. We will be replacing 2 items permanently with a brand new ShieldPro product. Our standard 5 gallon bag and 5 gallon zip bags, (both of which are still fabulous!), will be upgraded to the new ShieldPro 5 mil substrate (material). Even better is that our pricing on both items will remain exactly the same ($1.27 for the 5 gallon and $1.79 for the 5 gallon zip). We will be running clearance pricing on the 4.5 mil bags these are replacing. ($.99 or less for the 5 gallon and $1.09 or less for the 5 gallon zip in bulk), and as mentioned in the last post, this is the lowest price offered on the ‘Net for these bags. Please note there is nothing wrong with the 4.5 mil products, and they have been a staple with us for 3 years now and we have sold millions of them! However, with our improved buying power, we have been able to work much closer with manufacturing to increase the quality of our products without increasing any costs to our customers, which is a great win for everyone!

Please note that while it has been a very busy summer, we’re not done yet! We will be going back to manufacturing to figure out what other sizes and styles of bags folks might be needing. If you have any thoughts, please drop a comment or email! We don’t do any of this without input from our customers, as you are the most important thing in the world to us!

26

08 2013

Hey everyone, I hope y’all are having a great summer! We are having an awesome one, so I wanted to put up some updates.

First, we are very proud to start carrying the trademarked ShieldPro Brand Mylar Bags. These bags are specifically designed for long-term food storage. Not only are they beautiful, they offer absolutely awesome protection for your foods, with stellar oxygen and moisture barrier properties. If you listen to one of the prepper podcasts you might have heard our first radio commercial. We did it on the cheap, but I like the way it came out! Take a listen if you’re interested. We have one official ShieldPro bag currently available (a 1 gallon gusseted stand up bag), and we are currently scheduled to take delivery of a full truckload more on August 13-14 or so, so look for additional sizes then!

To help clear out some space in our warehouse, we are going to be putting up some awesome deals at the website. For example, for 5-gallon bags, we will be offering 30-packs for $29.70 and 50-packs for $49.50, or $.99 a bag, shipping included! If you’d like a larger quantity than that, we will go as low as $.89/each for 500 or more (email me!). We’ll also have on sale 2-gallon bags and 5-gallon zip seal bags starting tomorrow. Those who have read the blog often know I’m not prone to exaggeration, so I mean it when I say these prices may be the lowest you ever see for shipped bags.

Third on the agenda is the announcement of the Discount Mylar Bags Affiliate Program. This will not be applicable to most folks, and is intended more for bloggers or folks who run websites. Over the years I’ve had dozens of folks ask us if we run an affiliate program. Until now, we didn’t! But now we have one (Being run by Share-a-Sale) and will be offering a flat 10% for all orders referred to us through your affiliate link. If you’re interested you can sign up here, or email me at admin@discountmylarbags.com for more info.

Our final big announcement is personal in nature, which I don’t normally do, so skip this part if I offend! My wife and I have been together over 8 years now and married more than 5, and we always thought she couldn’t have kids. She tried treatments and things in her first marriage, and they didn’t work. I wasn’t about to fork out a whole lot of money to repeat the process, so we were content to spend our time together with each other and our dogs, and work on our own business and interests. Well, the Good Lord Almighty decided that His timing was Now. My wife is blessedly pregnant…with twins!!! I’m a little worried about being 60 when my kids are 18, but I am doing my best to get back into good shape so I can try to be a good dad and be around for them as long as I can. She is at 13 weeks now, we just had a 3d ultrasound done yesterday and all looks well so far, though they won’t be able to determine the sex of them until next time. All Prayers are very welcome, as we know we’re in a higher-risk age bracket (my wife is 38 and I am 42), plus twins are always a little more complicated.

It also means figuring out how to store 2 more years worth of food, this time for kids! Anyone with any advice on that and what you do for your younger kids, I’d love to hear it!

Thank you and have a great summer!

31

07 2013

Hey everyone, I know it’s been a while! While it has been quiet on the blog, we have been very busy behind the scenes trying to serve our customers better. I’ve been thinking about doing a video encapsulating our philosophy of doing business, and what makes us stand out. We have the best return customer rate in the business, and I thought we would share some of the reasons why. If you’ve been on the fence about ordering from us, I hope this gives you some indication of how far we will go to serve our customers! If you don’t know the address, here is our online store!

1) Same Day Shipping – In the beginning, there is very little to differentiate one seller from another. One of the ways we have done so from day one is offering same day shipping for all orders that come in until 3pm. And many days if I can manage it, I’ll ship everything that comes in until about 5pm, stopping by the Post Office on the way home to drop off packages which miss the regular pickup. Getting your package in the mail ASAP is very important to us. We work 7 days a week (about a half shift on Saturday and Sunday) to make sure you get your item as soon as humanly possible without using Express Service!

2) USPS Priority Mail Shipping for most orders – Whatever else one might say about USPS, I can attest that Priority Mail is the best reasonably costed standard shipping method available today. UPS Ground can compete for a certain geographical area, but no one else guarantees 2-3 day shipping times (In TN and parts of surrounding states, some folks have told us they got their package the next day!). This includes Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico. If you need your order as quick as possible, you can trust us to get it there. Just today, we had several customers on the phone who thanked us on getting their order to them ASAP.

3) We Value Your Privacy – I am a privacy nut myself, and so we go out of our way to protect yours. First, we use discrete packaging, meaning nothing will ever show up on your door with a big ‘Survival Stuff Inside!’ or giant ‘Discount Mylar Bags’ plastered all over the box. We have many folks who specifically request plain packaging, and this is to let everyone know we don’t have ANY outer packaging with our name on it. The only place you will see our name is the return address as required by our shipping carriers.

4) We Value Your Privacy, Part 2 – For all orders placed online, we NEVER see or have access to your credit card information. It is handled in exactly the same manner as it would be at a department or other retail store…invisibly and behind the scenes. Only our credit card processor actually sees your credit card number, so you never have to fear one of our employees gallivanting around Europe using your credit card!

5) We Value Your Privacy, Part 3 – While I’ve thought about doing one, we don’t have a mailing list. We don’t, and will never, sell your email to anyone for any reason. I hate junk mail in my inbox, and many of the survival stores are terrible about sending out a ton. The only way I would send an email to a customer is if they asked me to do a newsletter, and only then if they chose to opt in. This is currently not in the planning stage, so if you’d like to see one, let me know.

6) Free Shipping over $50 and on all kits – In the beginning I tested out ‘Free shipping on everything!’ That wasn’t very funny when I had dozens of folks placing orders for 2 Mylar Bags at $.25 each. Needless to say, we lost our shirts and had to change that policy quickly.=) We know $50 is a lot of money to some folks, and so we also offer free shipping on all our kits (located here). Our goal is not to make money on shipping, and we only have the minimum charge to cover the cost of processing and packaging small orders.

7) When We Screw Up, We Fix It – This is perhaps the defining aspect of how we run our business. While we do our best to get all orders out the door perfect, inevitably we’ll mess one up. However, you have my promise that I’ll fix it, quickly! Your satisfaction with your order is our only concern.

8) No Hassle Returns – Something not quite what you pictured when you bought it? No problem, you are welcome to return anything at any time for a full refund! Again, I only wish I could get the same from many of the places I order!=) We’ve accepted returns from customers who had their product for a year and finally said to themselves ‘I’m never going to do this’. And that’s OK, ship it back to us and we’ll refund it.

If there’s anything we can do serve you that we’re not currently doing, please let me know! We are working on getting some new bag sizes in to fill requests of customers, so I hope you’ll check back!

12

03 2013

When I first started prepping in around 2007 or so, water was a big concern…probably not as big as it should have been (I say this because almost every prepper I know puts off good water preparedness in favor of just about everything else, even though it should be done first!), but I knew we needed some. When I was researching filters, storing water in 55 gallon drums or smaller, more portable container, pool shock, bleach and the like, I happened upon an article about the Lifestraw (sorry, the page this goes to is pretty ugly). It seemed so simple compared to many filters, such as the Katadyn Hiker Pro I’ve had for years. The sad thing was, the Lifestraw wasn’t available at retail (or online); the company that made it sold it only to NGO’s, charities and the like for use in the 3rd world. Respectable, but frustrating as it seemed like an auto-include in every bug out bag, food storage kit, 72 hour kit, and other types of go-bags. About twice a year I would check up on it in the hopes that it was available for sale. Until this year, it wasn’t. The good news? Now it is! Even better, we have it!

I am so proud to introduce the Lifestraw, now available at Discount Mylar Bags. The Lifestraw is by far the easiest to use portable water filtration system ever designed. When I mentioned a few posts back that I wanted to carry only ‘best in class’ survival and preparedness gear, this is the type of item I was talking about. Some basic specs is that it reduces 99.99999% of waterborne bacteria and 99.9% of protozoan cysts (including giardia and cryptosporidium). It will filter over 250 gallons of water. And it is the easiest to use filter…just use like a straw (it will take some effort until the filter is wet). And at only 2 ounces, it will fit just about anywhere.

Better yet, we have the Lifestraw at the Minimum Advertised Price if you buy 5. With our Free Shipping, that means we have the Lifestraw available at the absolute lowest price available. To be more specific, I’ve structured the cost to go down $1 for each additional Lifestraw you buy, so it’s only $23.95 for 1, $22.95 for 2, $21.95 for 3, $20.95 for 4, and $19.95 for 5.

I usually try not to get too salesy on the blog, but for this item I made an exception due to it being the easiest way to get some water filtration into your Bug Out Bags. If anyone has any questions about the product, please drop us an email at admin@discountmylarbags.com

26

06 2012

Hey y’all, just to update you. We will be in Harrison, AR on June 15-16 for our first official DMB Food Storage Seminar and on-site product sale. It will be taking place at Prairie Market, an awesome natural and organic food store that has been running a series of preparedness-related seminars. On Friday night we will be doing a seminar on the basics of food storage from 5:00-6:30pm. On Saturday we’ll be there most of the day as for the sale, which will feature our most popular Mylar Bags and O2 Absorbers at 20% off our website pricing.

Everyone is welcome either day. A big part of Friday’s event will be allowing time to do a question and answer segment, so if there was ever anything you wanted to know about Mylar, food storage or O2 absorbers, now is the time to ask.